


Chains of Integrity

by dwyndling



Series: chi [10]
Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Canon Compliant, Gen, Keyblade Wielders (Kingdom Hearts), Keyblade-centric, Keyblades (Kingdom Hearts), Missing Ache (Keyblade), Void Gear (Keyblade)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-31
Updated: 2020-01-31
Packaged: 2021-02-27 05:35:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,242
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22291933
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dwyndling/pseuds/dwyndling
Summary: Coalescing into a parody of a humanity...tempered by anguish.
Series: chi [10]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1583548
Comments: 8
Kudos: 9





	Chains of Integrity

_Dawn is a gentle embrace, resting over him like a companion. He is alone, as usual, but it is nice to sit on the hill and let the kindly wind ruffle his hair like a caress. Mornings like this are common, without a party or any strong connections in his Union, most of his mornings pass in this fashion._

_The wind whispers kindly, in the ears of a lonely little boy._

_He is a keyblade wielder, one of many, of the many that live and train in Daybreak Town. The keyblade model he uses is deep black and green, rather like ivy, or perhaps a pale blue flower growing from black branches._

_It is a peaceful life...for the most part._

_The girl in the fox mask tells him he’s been selected for something more, plucked from total obscurity to something heavy with the weight of responsibility. Things happen in quick succession after that, and the young boy’s dreams now are painted with faces that he will never see again, even if he had never called them ‘friends’._

_And then..._

He has a (new) keyblade now, one well suited to his way of fighting with it. It curves nicely in his hold, not too heavy, but sturdy enough to withstand the sands of time.

_Wayward Wind. A little breeze, caught up in a storm._

His new master bears little to no similarities as the master he had once pledged Union to. It is a grueling training that he is subjected to, and at night, his dreams still flash with faces he no longer knows the name to. 

_There is a boy a little taller than him, with white hair and a kind smile. A girl, with quiet brown eyes and glittery stars at her ears. A young man with hair the color of faded rose petals, and another with a confident twinkle in his dark eyes._

It would not be incorrect to say he prefers the confusing empty nature of dreams to his waking routine. Master Xehanort is not what you would call considerate, but he manages under his tutelage. 

...for the most part.

And then...one day, there is a pain like a burst of diamond fragments, splintering in the deepest recesses of his being.

All is lost to oblivion.

Shadows coalesce...twisting and turning themselves into a roiling black mass, something that takes shape into human form, a boy, curled into the fetal position. From midair, he descends to touch lightly down on the dusty plateau, faceless nature obscured by the black helmet.

“...from Ventus riven...Vanitas.”

Words exist hollowly, as the shards of a broken heart fix themselves in a fragile parody of such wholeness. There is nothing beyond this moment, no understanding, no resignation.

Oddly shaped creatures rise out of his shadow, and chitter at him feebly. They burn with a force he does not know how to describe yet, and the wet blackness they can be crushed into burns even more. There is a ricochet effect, and the pained squeals of the beings are echoed in the cavity of his own chest.

This is...existence? A dredgery of empty pain and meaningless suffering?

And suddenly, though no one but him is there to see it, the features of the boy’s face change. Skin and hair visibly replace coiled darkness, even as the helmet continues to obscure all. 

Something begins, even if no one knows what yet.

There is another boy, who does not look like him, who instead has sandy golden hair and a genial air about him. He sees him in the midst of sleep sometimes, a boy whose very existence contradicts him, and he his.

They share one thing, besides being theoretically the same. There is a spark of something like darkness in the depths of his being, some leftover trace of an existence he cannot reclaim yet.

It flickers deep within, a key resting in the nether regions of his soul. When he calls it to hand, it’s material form is shaped like gears, blood red and with metal chains coiled round it. A brilliant blue eye, whose gaze he meets dead on with desperation.

_It's power. The power that can be wielded from the dark and broken parody of a heart. It feels like vengeance...like the closest he will ever come to an ally._

His other half wakens into a golden dawn, and he feels with acuity the sheer intensity of the healing. A ghost sensation, never fully realized, something within sight but out of reach. 

_Forge the X-blade. Then, and only then, will you be whole, and removed from suffering._

The three young wielders defeat more and more of his offspring, and the experience only hardens him. You cannot feel if the nerves are dead. Such logic is perfectly sound.

Finally, _finally,_ after far too long waffling around the Ocean Between, Ventus is before him, and they fight for earnest this time, as opposed to the toying back and forth from before. His body is brought to ruin, and the shadows cast by him bleed with his foul ilk.

_It’s now. The opportunity has finally come._

With Ventus on his knees before him, he sinks into the reconstructed heart that he came from, diving forth into the light that still accepts him like it _knows_ him.

Void Gear is abandoned, tossed aside without any conscious thought. Who has need for that, when a divine weapon, made from and by him is so close?

The X-blade comes to hand, resonating with him easily, the jagged power flowing through his limbs and illuminating him. It’s half made of his own heart after all, even in it’s rusted and incomplete state. Fully made of his own heart really, even split in twain.

They battle, as they were always meant to, on the stained glass beneath their feet. It is a thrill like no other, feeling so _himself_ and yet so foreign. He is face to face with the radiance that has always offset him like an unwanted spotlight, and the power rippling through his veins is something greater than he has ever known. 

And then, it slips from his grip, hanging gently in the air. With panicked hands, he reaches for it frantically, until the grey clouding his vision becomes to much to bear and his weight carries him backwards, down to the glass. 

The X-blade cracks, and shatters into a thousand glimmering shards. 

...and but a few moments after, he slowly does the same. The glass below him welcomes him back, and the darkness is a protective grasp this time around, even in it’s void nature.

The flicker that was given the name ‘Vanitas’ is submerged. Deep within the dark side of the heart, the reverse of the glass reflection.

Ventus falls into a sleep from which there is no natural waking, and far far away from where his empty body rests, one heart shelters another, which shelters another deep within.

_We will not speak of the heart plucked out of midair. Of the shell it was pressed into. Of meeting his own face from across the battlefield, a mirror which reflects only void. Of the boy broken apart and crafted together with pain and misery, fading into jet-black shadows a decade hence._

_That is a different story._

Light coils around dark. Dark coils within light. Ventus sleeps on, his heart quiet and dim near the brightness of a child’s.

_Is this...peace?_


End file.
